The time when finance was our enemy is over; says Bruno Le Maire

At the opening of the 5th economic and financial dialogue between France and China, the Minister of Economy said that “the time when France declared that finance was our enemy is over.”

The French Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire , assured Friday in Beijing that finance was no longer “the enemy” of his country and posted the objective of making the Paris marketplace the leader of green finance .

Finance is no longer an enemy. “France wants to become again a major world financial center,” said the minister at the opening of the 5th high-level economic and financial dialogue between France and China in Beijing, where he went to prepare for the visit of State of President Emmanuel Macron early next year .

A power element. “The time when France declared that finance was our enemy is over,” assured Bruno Mayor, in the presence of Chinese Deputy Prime Minister Ma Kai, in an obvious allusion to the words of former President Francois Hollande who had called the finance “enemy” during his speech of Bourget during the presidential campaign of 2012.

“France wants to make finance an element of economic power and cooperation with its major partners, first and foremost China,” insisted the minister. However, he said that his country was not trying to attract “predatory and voracious finance”, but that “in the service of real economic projects, business development and sustainable development”.

“Leader in Green Finance”. Bruno Le Maire also recalled the upcoming December 12th summit in Paris on climate finance launched by Emmanuel Macron. “Paris wants to be a leader in green finance,” he said. “Finance for environmental projects, the ecological transition of financing wind projects, research into the storage of renewable energy,” he added.

A requirement of “reciprocity”. Bruno Le Maire seized the opportunity to reiterate the message he came to bring to the Chinese authorities, demanding “reciprocity” in trade and economic relations with China. “It takes reciprocity, mutual benefits for trade to be a factor of peace and development in the world,” he said. “This is the best response to brutal protectionism that will bring nothing good to our people or to global growth,” he insisted.

Complementary countries. For his part, the Vice Premier of China stressed the “complementarity” between France and China and called for the two countries “to create new engines of growth in the world”, including from innovation and new technologies. “We are already working in the nuclear, aerospace and green economy sectors, and we want to extend this cooperation to finance,” he said.